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Reporters Without Borders said in it’s 2005 special report titled “Xinhua: the world’s biggest propaganda agency”, that “Xinhua remains the voice of the sole party”, “particularly during the SARS epidemic, Xinhua has for last few months been putting out news reports embarrassing to the government, but they are designed to fool the international community, since they are not published in Chinese.”

Chinese Restaurant Owner Dies from Labor Camp Torture

New York – A 42-year-old owner of a dumpling restaurant in Northeast China died in his home at the end of February, unable to recover from one and half years of physical and mental torture in a Re-education Through Labor (RTL) camp, the Falun Dafa Information Center has learned. His is one of over 400 documented Falun Gong deaths in Liaoning province since 1999.

Mr. Shi Hongbo (史红波), who owned a restaurant in Jinzhou district of Dalian in Liaoning province, was abducted outside of his home on October 14, 2008 while en route to work. Three weeks later he was sentenced to the Dalian RTL Camp for one and a half years. Camp personnel subjected him to numerous rounds of torture, including shocking him simultaneously with multiple electric batons and tying him down for several days at a time with all four limbs stretched out. As a result, Shi developed heart problems and high blood pressure. In September 2009, Shi was transferred to Weiningying Re-education Through Labor (RTL) Camp.
According to sources inside China, fully conscious of Shi’s heart condition, personnel at Weiningying nevertheless shocked him in the neck with electrical batons on October 10, 2009, until he lost consciousness. Shi’s health continued to deteriorate. His weight dropped from 215 pounds to 160 pounds, and doctors at hospitals in Dalian (Central Hospital and No. 3 Hospital) and in Benxi diagnosed him with heart problems, high blood pressure, kidney problems, and lung complications. Shi was eventually released on April 1, 2010. Upon returning home, he continued to suffer from a persistent fever and cough, never recovering from the torture.

Shi Hongbo died on February 28, 2011. He was 42 years old. He is survived by his 75-year-old mother.

“No parent wants to be in the situation of surviving their only child. Yet, the Communist Party—with its brutal campaign to target every Falun Gong practitioner—has precisely inflicted this pain on Shi’s mother,” says Falun Dafa information Center spokesperson Mr. Erping Zhang. “A perfectly healthy man, abducted en route to work one day, returned home a year and a half later, a mere shadow of himself.”

“Shi’s death reaffirms Liaoning province’s reputation as one of the deadliest regions of China for Falun Gong practitioners. Beneath the veneer of Dalian’s growing metropolis, Shi endured torture the horrors of which are nearly impossible for many of us to fully comprehend.”

There are over 3,400 known cases of Falun Gong practitioners who have died as a result of persecution in China, though the actual death toll is certainly higher given the difficulty of obtaining information on such abuses. For years, Liaoning province has been one of the deadliest provinces – more than 400 adherents are documented to have died there from abuse since 1999.

Additional Information

On the day of Shi’s abduction in October 2008, his elderly mother and housemate Ms. Cong Pijing were also taken by police to Rixin Street Police Station in Dalian’s Xigang District. The older woman was released the next day, but Cong was subjected to severe torture at Yaojia Detention Center, causing one of her vertebrae to dislocate. Like Shi, she was sentenced to RTL, but the camp refused to accept her because of her delicate condition and she was allowed to return home.

Individuals and facilities reported to have participated in persecuting Shi Hongbo: